American SPA MPP 2021

[LDmpp21]

Hi all! Has anyone heard from American about MPP funding? I know they said they might start sending notifications about merit aid at the end of February and I’m curious to know if they have started. 
Thanks!

[MPA2021]

I received my funding offer via email yesterday from SPA, though I was admitted to the MPA program. I emailed them yesterday morning and they said merit aid offers were just starting to be sent out.

[LDmpp21]

32 minutes ago, MPA2021 said:

I received my funding offer via email yesterday from SPA, though I was admitted to the MPA program. I emailed them yesterday morning and they said merit aid offers were just starting to be sent out.

That’s super helpful - thank you!

[Ontic]

Does anyone have an idea on when MPP folks will get funding info? 

Edited March 8, 2021 by Ontic

[LDmpp21]

I just heard via email about my funding offer. The information was all in a PDF attachment in the email, not on the portal! Good luck to others!

Edited March 8, 2021 by LDmpp21

[GradSchoolGrad]

I strongly recommend you all stay away from SPA (for graduate students...) as a Policy school period, unless you have no other options or have extensive amounts of funding.

I mean, obviously, you should do your own due diligence and base your life choices off of more than some guy on a forum. 

However, this is the advice I told my family members because:

... Although American has been massively pumping money into SPA with lots of fancy new infrastructure and marketing, that has not translated to quality of a program.,

My take:

a. Low Peer Quality: I have done competitions and conferences at SPA and with/against SPA students - some of the most unimpressive cohort among the policy students I have encountered. The only exceptions are those who have 10+ years work experience who went to SPA because they had great funding. 

I witnessed classes with American SPA students, the class participation was often below undergrad level mind numbing. Simple questions, of why can't I do this research without data were asked

b. Lower Calibre Instructors: The academic quality was difficult for me to stomach - I was shocked that one of my friends (a PhD candidate), was teaching a graduate level SPA class (which had MPPs and MPAs) at American. Yes, the person is my friend, but taking graduate school classes from someone with 3.5 years policy experience is shocking. 

d. The Waiter Test:  every time I have randomly had a waiter in the Northeast who is an MPP, its has been an American grad - not scientific... but to me its an indicator. DC is swimming with policy grads... I'm 3/3 for MPP waiters being from American.

e. Career Routing Indicators: Never encountered a SPA student at any competitive blue chip internship (yes the definition of this can be subjective) - and I have been involved in Ed Policy, Defense, IR, Tech, and Regulations 

I'm sure there are amazing students at SPA, I mean they do send 5-7 students to the PMF, but its always better in my opinion to be with a strong cohort at large.

[MPPNYC]

37 minutes ago, GradSchoolGrad said:

I strongly recommend you all stay away from SPA (for graduate students...) as a Policy school period, unless you have no other options or have extensive amounts of funding.

I mean, obviously, you should do your own due diligence and base your life choices off of more than some guy on a forum. 

However, this is the advice I told my family members because:

... Although American has been massively pumping money into SPA with lots of fancy new infrastructure and marketing, that has not translated to quality of a program.,

My take:

a. Low Peer Quality: I have done competitions and conferences at SPA and with/against SPA students - some of the most unimpressive cohort among the policy students I have encountered. The only exceptions are those who have 10+ years work experience who went to SPA because they had great funding. 

I witnessed classes with American SPA students, the class participation was often below undergrad level mind numbing. Simple questions, of why can't I do this research without data were asked

b. Lower Calibre Instructors: The academic quality was difficult for me to stomach - I was shocked that one of my friends (a PhD candidate), was teaching a graduate level SPA class (which had MPPs and MPAs) at American. Yes, the person is my friend, but taking graduate school classes from someone with 3.5 years policy experience is shocking. 

d. The Waiter Test:  every time I have randomly had a waiter in the Northeast who is an MPP, its has been an American grad - not scientific... but to me its an indicator. DC is swimming with policy grads... I'm 3/3 for MPP waiters being from American.

e. Career Routing Indicators: Never encountered a SPA student at any competitive blue chip internship (yes the definition of this can be subjective) - and I have been involved in Ed Policy, Defense, IR, Tech, and Regulations 

I'm sure there are amazing students at SPA, I mean they do send 5-7 students to the PMF, but its always better in my opinion to be with a strong cohort at large.

Classic Georgetown graduate response, ha. 

[GradSchoolGrad]

Just now, MPPNYC said:

Classic Georgetown graduate response, ha. 

You can see my comments about Georgetown (McCourt MPP as well). I am brutally honest about its shortcomings. 

[Ontic]

Applications were apparently up 90% this year 

[GradSchoolGrad]

On 3/10/2021 at 1:42 PM, Ontic said:

Applications were apparently up 90% this year 

Applications were up everywhere since a lot of grad schools made the GRE option. That lowered the barrier for application. 

[Ontic]

On 3/14/2021 at 3:07 PM, GradSchoolGrad said:

Applications were up everywhere since a lot of grad schools made the GRE option. That lowered the barrier for application. 

Yeah I was just sharing cause it was the first real concrete number I had heard about the increase in admissions (from the schools I applied to).

I got a really nice funding offer so nothing is off the table right now, but I appreciate all the advice you give on here. 

[mcrmpp]

I just heard about my half tuition award this week, so I think they're still in the process of rolling awards out. 

[mjmcflurry]

Was also awarded half tuition for the MPA! Makes the cost effectiveness of this program pretty competitive.